I also agree that there is a very broad consensus that letting poor people starve in the gutter is wrong, even if it is in the short-term interest of the oligarchy. However, even when backed by a massive (if not quite unanimous - Uncle Miltie and his Chicago Boyz would disagree) consensus, it remains a political position, and there is no point pretending that it's scientifically supported.

In fact, I think it can be downright harmful to present what is inherently a political decision as a technical matter than can be unambiguously resolved through the scientific method. After all, Uncle Miltie and Maggie Thatcher got a lot of traction out of obfuscating the political decisions that underlie much of the economic science (and pseudoscience) that they used.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.